Our Canada based Law Firm is staffed with more than 25 licensed lawyers, licensed immigration consultants and technical personnel. Our firm represents international celebrities in the fashion industry and performing arts as well as some of North America’s largest corporations in their immigration and staffing projects.

An Electronic Travel Authorization (eTA) is a new requirement for foreign nationals from visa-exempt countries arriving in Canada by air, whether to visit the country directly or to pass through in transit.

The Minimum Education Requirement (for Applications Received on or after May 04, 2013)

The authorities have prescribed certain educational requirements that applicants would need to meet. To meet these requirements, applicants would need to:

Submit their completed Canadian educational credentials or,

Submit their completed foreign educational credentials and the Equivalency Assessment (ECA) report issued by a designated assessment organisation or institution

The applicants would need to submit these documents along with their applications to the Centralised Intake Office (CIO). The equivalency assessment would need to be less than five years old on the date on which the Centralised Intake Office (CIO) receives the application.

Situations could arise where the authorities have designated a professional body for the primary occupation specified in the application. In this scenario, the applicant would need to submit:

A completed foreign diploma, certificate or credential relevant to that occupation and,

The Equivalency Assessment (ECA) report issued by a designated professional body

This Equivalency Assessment (ECA) report would serve to establish that the completed foreign diploma, certificate or credential is equivalent to the completed Canadian educational credential required for practising that occupation. The report would enable the applicant to practice the specific occupation in at least one of the provinces in which the authorities recognise the equivalency assessments issued by this professional body.

It is worth noting that this Equivalency Assessment (ECA) report would need to:

Be issued by the designated professional body and,

Be less than five years old on the date on which the applicants make the application

This is in accordance with the provisions specified in R75 (2.1).

In addition, the authorities would use these Equivalency Assessment (ECA) reports as conclusive evidence that the applicant’s completed foreign diplomas, certificates or credentials are equivalent to the completed Canadian educational credentials. This is especially so to meet the provisions specified in R75 (2) (e), R75 (2.1) and R78.

Typically, these Equivalency Assessment (ECA) reports would also need to include an assessment by the organisation or institution. This assessment would verify the authenticity of the completed foreign diploma, certificate or credential.

Applicants might wish to acquire more details on this subject. For this, they would need to refer to the section that concerns the authenticity of foreign educational credentials given subsequently in this document (refer to Appendix C).

Note:

The applicant would also need to submit at least a completed Canadian secondary educational credential or its equivalent

This would enable the applicant to meet the minimum education requirement

It is worth remembering that the Centralised Intake Office (CIO) will only accept reports issued by a designated organisation or institution designated by Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) as an equivalency assessment for the purpose of a Federal Skilled Worker Class application.